"Rarely have terrorists chosen their target with so much malicious care as
in Thursday night's attack on Jerusalem's Mercaz Harav Yeshiva. In striking
the flagship institution of the religious Zionist movement, a Jerusalem
landmark whose history is linked with the founding and fulfillment of the
Jewish national home in the Land of Israel, the gunman aimed his weapon at
the heart of the Zionist enterprise."
Calev Ben-David, Jerusalem Post

"Mercaz HaRav is the flagship of the entire religious Zionist movement. The
terrorist targeted a place that symbolizes love for the land of Israel, love
for the people of Israel and love for the Torah. No Jewish soul can remain
indifferent to the horrible thought that a despicable terrorist attacked a
group of young men who were busy studying the holy Torah."
Rabbi David Stav, one of many prominent graduates of yeshivat Mercaz HaRav

"We split a division of values with all the nations of the world. They are
destined to advance the world's external aspects, and we advance its
internal aspects.
"But Amalek is the exact opposite of Israel's holy aim. Amalek needs to be
blotted out in order that God's Name and His throne will be whole."

Rabbi Avraham Yitzchak haKohen Kook, Shmoneh Kevatzim VI:252

===============================================

In order to better understand what Yeshivat Mercaz HaRav is all about, below
I have quoted from a personal account of my experiences there (taken from my
preface to Gold from the Land of Israel):

In the spring of 1981, I spent a few weeks searching for a suitable yeshivah
in Israel for the coming year. Together with several friends, we toured
various institutions, until we made our last stop, the Jerusalem yeshivah
founded by Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook in 1924.

I will never forget that first visit to Mercaz HaRav.  Over the years, I
have visited and studied in a wide variety of yeshivot in America and in
Israel, great and small, "black-hat" and "knitted-kippah," Zionist,
non-Zionist, and anti-Zionist. But this building in the Kiryat Moshe
neighborhood of Jerusalem possessed some intangible aspect – a vibrant
idealism, an electricity in the air – that I have never encountered
elsewhere. It was as if an aura of the supernal light mentioned so often in
Rav Kook's writings had somehow descended and enveloped his yeshivah.

By that time, of course, Rav Kook  was no longer alive. Even his son, Rabbi
Tzvi Yehudah Kook, already in his early 90's, was so ill that the only class
he was still able to teach was a Saturday night lecture at his home. (He
passed away the following year.) Nonetheless, there was something special
about the atmosphere at Mercaz HaRav that enchanted me. I admit, the
decision to enter Mercaz HaRav was not fully based on rational, logical
factors. I cannot claim that I was drawn by the scholarship of the faculty
or the erudition of the lectures, since I had not been in the country long
enough to fully understand classes in Talmud delivered in rapid-fire Hebrew.
And I had never even studied any of Rav Kook's writings. But the special
atmosphere that I felt there, a wonderful combination of seriousness and
joy, of "rejoicing in trembling," convinced me that this is where I wanted
to study.

In the yeshivah, one seemed to absorb the Torah philosophy of Rav Kook by
osmosis. At other yeshivas, I had sensed the holiness in the Torah study and
prayer, but this was a holiness that came from one's private connection to
God. In Mercaz HaRav, one felt that his personal avodat Hashem (service of
God) was part of the spiritual connection between the soul of the nation and
the God of Israel. When studying in the Beit Midrash, there was an
atmosphere of excitement and creative energy, a sense that we were part of a
much larger entity. Our intellectual efforts were not just about our own
private spiritual growth; we were helping establish the spiritual
foundations of the nation.

==============================================

For a report on the eulogies of the eight martyred students, see:
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/125491

"Let the tribes of His nation sing praise, for He will avenge His servants'
blood. He will bring vengeance upon His foes, and reconcile His people to
His land." (Deut. 32:43)

"He will swallow up death for all time. God will wipe away the tears from
every face, and He will remove the shame of his people from the entire
earth." (Isaiah 25:8)

With wishes for a Chodesh tov and Shabbat Shalom, and good news,
Chanan Morrison